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Covid-19: ACCA offers remote exam-taking

ACCA is to introduce remote exams for students around the world to enable them to take their exams at home or in another location in circumstances where centre-based exam sittings are disrupted as a result of the current pandemic

7 May 2020

Pat Sweet

The body, which has 527,000 students (including affiliates) in 179 countries, said it has developed a robust and secure way of using the latest technology to enable remote invigilation of ACCA qualification exams.

Exams will be taken online and supervised remotely by a live invigilator. There is a system of checks involving biometrics, artificial intelligence and recording to ensure integrity.

ACCA said it is aiming to have the remote option up and running by June for its on-demand exams (applied knowledge and foundation level exams) and September for its session-based applied skills exams. Updates on the situation regarding its strategic professional exams will be provided soon.

Alan Hatfield, ACCA’s executive director, strategy and development, said: ‘ACCA aims to offer remote invigilation to students as widely as possible in circumstances and locations where our centre-based exams will need to be cancelled for health and safety reasons, or are affected by disruption.

‘Exam entry is open for September and we know students are already planning for this session. We advise students to book exams in their local centre as usual and we’ll provide updates if circumstances change.

‘We are consulting with our learning partners on its introduction and how best to support our students, and we’ll continue to learn from their experience – and that of our students – on how remote invigilation might be further developed in the future.’

‘We recognise the disruption and frustration the pandemic and resulting exam cancellations have caused for our students and their desire to progress, and this development will ensure their opportunity to do so.’

In March, ICAEW announced cancellations and changes to its June and July examinations because of the global challenges posed by coronavirus.

The June ACA professional level exam has been cancelled, while the advanced level ACA exams due to take place in July have been postponed until the end of August.

At the time, ICAEW said it is exploring several options to accommodate students who have been affected, including larger exam sittings.